1. Ticket Time
2. Breathe (aka Believe)
3. Wither, I’m A Flower
4. Barns On Fire
5. Street With Sirens (a.k.a. Things I Heard)
6. Ten Seconds To The End Of The World
7. Turn Around
8. Everything I Do
9. Losering
10. Theme For A Trucker
11. Dancing With The Women At The Bar
12. Dreams
13. My Heart Is Broken
14. Luxury Liner
15. Houses On The Hill
16. All You Can Feel
17. Further Down The Road (aka Indian Gown)
18. Kiss & Make Up
19. The Rain Won’t Help You When It’s Over

2-6
The Bug Sessions, possibly recorded during 1998 or 1999
7-12
Sessions recorded in Hoboken, New Jersey, possibly during 1998 or 1999
13-16
Heartbreaker sessions.

Tracks 1-12 have previous circulated as the Fucker Demos; the last four tracks were found on an alternate release of this boot (Fucker Version 2). Hence the Complete Fucker.

The other day I talked a little bit about how the ways in which I receive bootlegs has changed. Discovering MP3 bootleg blogs was a bit like going down the rabbit hole. I found one blog which linked to several others which in turn linked to more and so on into a never ending spiral. It was fantastic. As stated I went a bit mad and downloaded everything that looked remotely interesting, until I bloated my hard drive, and realized it would take me the rest of my life to listen to the music I now owned.

My downloading from blogs has now gone down to a trickle. Sure I still download music from artists I really love (like this boot from the huge Ryan Adams collection I linked to earlier) or others that just sound really interesting. But I’ve tried to keep it to a minimum, realizing both that my chances of listening to most of it is slim, and that I prefer to have my posts consist of boots I’ve received in trades or torrents and not from other, competing blogs.

This is all to say I’m getting very close to having uploaded every bootleg on my hard drive. I’ve finally just about caught up with all that downloading I did (well except for a bunch of Grateful Dead, but you guys just don’t seem to download from them.) This is not to say that I’m going to have to shut the blog down. I still have loads of CDs that I have yet to rip or upload to the site. Just from what I’ve already obtained should last me to the end of the year, and likely well beyond. I’m still also active in some vine sites and of course torrents. So I plan to stay very active in this blog (well except during the upcoming travel season but we’ve already talked about that) so you can look forward to lots more good stuff, and high quality at that.

I think I originally got this great Whiskeytown boot from the equally great boot blog The Steam Engine, but his link is dead so I’m sharing the bounty.

Whiskeytown
Those Weren’t The Days

1. My Heart Is Broken
2. Things I Heard
3. Luxury Liner
4. Kiss And Make Up
5. Further Down The Road
6. Believe
7. 10 Seconds ‘Til The End Of The World
8. The Rain Won’t Help You When It’s Over
9. Ticket Time
10. Wither, I’m A Flower
11. Hipshake
12. Here’s To The Rest Of The World
13. Empty Baseball Park
14. San Antonio
15. Factory Girl
16. All You Can Feel
17. New York Angel
18. Only To Lose
19. Dreams

Whiskeytown was a mix of country music, punk rock and drunkenness. They were one of the forerunners of the alternative country movement. They were also a revolving cast of characters save for their two leads, Ryan Adams and Caitlin Cary. No other members of the band lasted more than a couple of years. Like so many other things involving Ryan Adams, Whiskeytown self-destructed after a while. In the few years they survived, however, they became one of the most influential elements to alt-country, and spouted many would-be torch carriers.

They officially released only three albums, but there is a plethora of unreleased material available on the Internet. Ryan Adams writes music like I eat sandwiches: with finesse, gusto and at regular intervals. I swear he has written and recorded more unreleased music than he put on officially sanctioned record-store shelves. My notes on Forever Valentine say that Adams got the band together in the studio wanting to record a full album but without the label’s knowledge. I can’t say whether this was the first time he had pulled that trick, but it certainly wasn’t the last. I haven’t the slightest idea why he decided to record so much music without making it officially available to anyone, but fans are all the better for it. Whiskeytown broke up some ten years ago, but with a little digging their are still songs to find.

I don’t believe I have ever talked about an unofficially released, studio-recorded, non-live album before on Bootleg Country. Yet they are an essential part of my bootleg experience. So many artists have recorded songs, and entire albums that for whatever reason never get officially released. There are so many gems out there that can’t be purchased at a record store, but need to be heard.

Whenever I listen to Whiskeytown, I immediately realize how much I miss hearing Ryan Adams duet with a feminine voice. Caitlin Cary adds so much depth to his songs. Ryan often writes songs of great heart ache and Cary’s harmonies both strengthen it and add to its fragility. On songs like “Easy Hearts” the mixture of Ryan and Caitlin’s voice makes part of my insides tingle and weep. It is also one of two songs (the other being “Don’t Wanna Know Why”) that made it onto the officially released Pneumonia, but in slightly different versions. I actually prefer this version of “Easy Hearts” as it is more raw and emotional than the one on Pneumonia.

Like so much of Adam’s output much of Forever Valentine is full of melancholy and heartbreak. The guy just knows how to write a sad song. My favorites are when he matches the mournful lyrics with music and melodies that elevate the sad bastard lyrics into something more. Songs like “Anyone But Me (aka Dial Tone)” retain the depths of sorrow, but are also a great deal of fun to listen to, and sing along.

Not all is so depressing, on “Rays of Light” they unleash their inner punk rockers and spill loud, distorted guitars all over the place. It is a hint of what would come years later when Ryan unleashed his Strokes-inspired album Rock N Roll.

Forever Valentine shows just how amazingly talented Ryan Adams is – who else would record a full album this good, only to leave most of it sitting on shelf for all eternity? It is also a great reminder of what a lovely voice Caitlin Cary has and makes me wonder why she hasn’t found the success her (however brief) musical partner has had. Ryan Adams is currently retired from music. Potentially he has released everything he is going to release. If all you have is his officially released albums, you really are missing out. Go digging online and you can find so much more. Hopefully he’ll be me and those sandwiches, I might give them up for a time, but I always come back for more.

NOTES:
Chris Stamey — “Skillet played drums,
I played bass. Recorded in Raleigh at Scores/Slackmates,
and at Modern, my place.” “Addendum: I forgot to add
that the piano player on the Forever Valentine
Whiskeytown sessions was Ben Folds. My memory was
jogged by his smashing show this Saturday at the Cradle.”

Skillet Gilmore — “Forever Valentine was recorded
around Xmas ’97. The band at the time (for the purposes
of recording) was Ryan, Caitlin, Mike Daly, Ed Crawford
on guitar, Chris Stamey on bass and me.” “Although the
record was made in about a week, the challenge was actually
that Ryan wanted to make a record without the label knowing
about it. And so we did.”

Tennessee Square
Today
Turn Around
Believe
Highway 145
Think About Me
Set Your Fires
It’s Gonna Rain
Bottom Of The Glass
Theme For A Trucker
I Hope It Rains At My Funeral
Ticket Time
The Rain Won’t Help You
Factory Girl
Wither, I’m A Flower

1. Ticket Time
2. Breathe (aka Believe)
3. Wither, I’m A Flower
4. Barns On Fire
5. Street With Sirens (a.k.a. Things I Heard)
6. Ten Seconds To The End Of The World
7. Turn Around
8. Everything I Do
9. Losering
10. Theme For A Trucker
11. Dancing With The Women At The Bar
12. Dreams
13. My Heart Is Broken
14. Luxury Liner
15. Houses On The Hill
16. All You Can Feel
17. Further Down The Road (aka Indian Gown)
18. Kiss & Make Up
19. The Rain Won’t Help You When It’s Over

About

Welcome to Bootleg Nation. I have been collecting live music bootlegs for about 10 years now. At this site you will find bootleg reviews, info on obtaining bootlegs, and everything I love about live music.

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I will no longer be writing to this site. Please come to The Midnight Cafe for my current writings on all things pop culture.
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